MCCAFFERY: Sixers' rebuilding plan did not include turnovers

PHILADELPHIA — The Sixers made a decision, rammed it into a slogan, covered themselves in NBA reality and began to reinvent themselves. No one complained. No one questioned Sam Hinkie’s talent-evaluation skills. Few disputed that one recognized path to pro-basketball success was to first accept some losses, and that it was the No. 1 stain on David Stern’s otherwise fine record.

Together they would build.

Got it. OK. Accepted. Understood.

But where in that wink-wink exchange was it approved to play the way the Sixers did the other night in Brooklyn, when they turned the ball over 26 times, and in 26 different and creative ways?

And which rubber stamp was it that allowed them surrender 109.9 points a game, the most in pro basketball, too many like the Nets were able to score, 14 of 21 in the paint during one unsightly stretch of a 30-point third quarter?

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There is not likely to be an uproar about any of that, not as there would be were the Eagles turning it over so often, or if the Phillies’ bullpen was so easily scored upon. What? Are the Sixers going to make the playoffs this season even if they don’t make another turnover?

But building is more than just figuring out a way to move Evan Turner out one door while trying to smuggle Andrew Wiggins in through another. It’s more than calculating cap values and draft-lottery odds. It’s more than trying to learn if there be much value for veteran players before the trade deadline.

At some point, the Sixers are must play more responsibly, not just for their 2013-2014 nerves, but for what they expect the program to be in a position to benefit from once the draft-day fluctuations tilt their way.

Build, yes. Throw the ball all over New York while losing a game that could have been won? No. Is that the kind of precision that Michael J. Fox and Beyonce thought they were paying to watch during the Nets’ 108-102 victory? Russell Wilson, seated nearby, must have thought he was watching the Denver Broncos again.

Brett Brown knows the score, even if the score is typically well into triple figures for almost every Sixers opponent. He might have a “Together We Build” tee-shirt, but he doesn’t wear it in public. He remembers earlier in the season when the Sixers were winning some games, and seeming to enjoy it, no matter how inconvenient that would look once the ping-pong balls started to swirl. He just can’t understand why the Sixers keep making basketballs ricochet in odd directions, too.

“I can’t,” he said. “I wish I could. It continues to haunt us. We have to get more responsible with the ball. I have to do a better job. It bites us continually.”

Brown is playing with an inferior roster, one projected by Las Vegas before the season to win about 16 times. His team already has 15 W’s, a suggestion, if not proof, that it has overachieved. The Sixers needed a coach with patience, and Brown’s has been contagious, his ability to communicate perfect for soothing fans that might otherwise have been more demanding.

But even he seems tired of the chronic imprecision, channeling as he did his inner Andy Reid, challenging himself to keep a more tidy turnover column of the boxscore.

The Sixers appear beaten down, aware that they don’t have enough skill to make it safely through 82 games. Once a team is demoralized, it relaxes on defense and throws the ball away at the other end. That cycle is tough to stop.

Despite needing only to travel about 90 miles home from Brooklyn late Monday night, and aware that they will face the visiting Boston Celtics Wednesday, Brown did not order a practice Tuesday. Even when a two-a-day might have been the play, perhaps the rest will prove helpful.

The Sixers have lost 13 of their last 16, and are down to one more Allen Iverson night, the final in a lengthy series, to keep the customers distracted. After that, they will have to play a little more responsible professional basketball.

Because turnovers and soft defense was never part of that building-project deal.